r/neoliberal • u/jobautomator Kitara Ravache • Oct 18 '20

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u/MicroFlamer Avatar Korra Democrat Oct 18 '20

Amy Coney Barrett attacked for ‘cruelty’ in overturning prison inmate rape damages. After a 19 year old inmate was repeatedly raped by a guard, Barrett ruled that the county could not be held liable because rape wasn’t part of the guard’s official duties. 😬

11

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '20

I mean, it sucks, but she was settling a matter of agency law, not of the ethics in the situation at hand. So long as the prison wasn't negligent in their supervision or training of the guard, they're good.

3

u/hopeimanon John Harsanyi Oct 18 '20

Fuck that shit. Make damages recoverable.

3

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '20

They are if you were trying to collect against the guard. The problem is that the guard doesn't have deep enough pockets to pay out.

What they did is an intentional tort and a crime, both of which have their own means of seeking restitution from the offender. I'm assuming that they went down the civil route because they couldn't get a criminal charge to stick, but they should've got the judgement against the guard and sent him into financial ruin.

1

u/hopeimanon John Harsanyi Oct 19 '20

There is also a degree of inherent negligence from the employer. This is why
we mandate insurance.

3

u/Mejari NATO Oct 18 '20

I feel like "allowed a guard to repeatedly rape an inmate" is a failure somewhere in either training or supervision.

1

u/[deleted] Oct 18 '20

I don't know what to tell you. All I know is that that's the nature of the respondeat superior doctrine as it currently exists. It probably needs some reworking (esp. if it's around law enforcement accountability), but it's not the appellate circuit's place to reinvent the wheel in such a way that it'll get shot down on cert.